Viktor Nebozhenko, the head of the sociological service Ukrainian Barometer, expressed an opinion that in anticipation of the election of 2012, the Ukrainian authorities will reanimate religious and language issues.
According to him, the authorities will base their election campaigns strategy on divisions. “They will use previous contrapositions of the west and east of Ukraine, center and provinces and, definitely, religious subjects. These three things will be used to manipulate the public opinion. Did you notice that at the moment of the death of the miner [editor: during the forced dispersal of the participants of the protest of Chornobyl liquidators in Donetsk], a little-known deputy of the Party of Regions stated that Galicia should be separated from Ukraine? That was the information discharge to distract attention from the subject of the death of a person,” said the expert.
“I think that after the New Year, in order to neutralize the spring tension, the authorities will raise the subject of re-distribution of churches and merging of denominations. And the language question will be put off till the last moment. For if that question is settled, the authorities will have no more tools for manipulation,” added the expert.